IRTA Test Qatar - Day 1, Results

125cc

1. Bradley SMITH APRILIA 2:06.568
2. Andrea IANNONE APRILIA 2:06.708
3. Julian SIMON APRILIA 2:07.042
4. Sergio GADEA APRILIA 2:07.843
5. Joan OLIVE DERBI 2:08.062
6. Jonas FOLGER APRILIA 2:08.391
7. Sandro CORTESE DERBI 2:08.502
8. Pol ESPARGARO DERBI 2:08.531
9. Esteve RABAT APRILIA 2:08.617
10. Randy KRUMMENACHER APRILIA 2:08.783
11. Scott REDDING APRILIA 2:08.985
23. Matthew HOYLE HAOJUE 2:17.277

Bradley Smith - Biography

As the Aspar Team have now published a big and career stats press release for Bradley, it seems opportune to post it all up here for completeness...


BRADLEY SMITH #38
Date of Birth: 28/11/1990 - Garsington - Oxfordshire - Great Britain
Age: 18
First race: Motocross - January 1997
First Grand Prix: Spain Grand Prix - 2006
First Victory: --
Last Victory: --
First Pole: Qatar Grand Prix - 2008
First Fastest Lap: --
First Podium: England Grand Prix - 2005
Victories: --
Podiums: 5
Pole Positions: 3
Fastest Laps: --
Best General Result: 125cc World Championship - 6th
Total Grand Prix appearances: 47 - 125cc

CAREER SO FAR
1997 - 1st Cotswold Winter Championship
1st Bedfont Lakes Summer and Winter Club Championship
1998 - 1st Winter Vale of White Horse Championship
1st Summer Cotswold Championship
4th All British Championship
1999 - 15th All British Junior 65 Championship
2000 - 4th National BSMA Championship
6th British Supercross Championship
2001 - 1st British Supercross Championship
2002 - 3rd Sheffield Supercross
2003 - 1st Future West Supercross
Several victories in BSMA and KWS Championship
2004 - 4th MRO Superteen Championship
7th MRO GP 125cc Championship
2005 - 10th British Championship - 125cc
2nd CEV -Spanish Championship 125cc
2006 - 20th World Championship 125cc
2007 - 8th World Championship 125cc
2008 - 6th World Championship 125cc

BIOGRAPHY
Nobody could lay claim to an earlier start in motorcycle culture than Bradley Smith, who grew up just 100 metres from a motorcross track that was owned by his parents in his native Oxford. For as long as he can remember Bradley has helped out his father maintain the track - from planning it and grooming it to just taking walks around it, Bradley's dream since he was in nappies was a future as a motorcycle racer.

As soon as he came home from school, Bradley would spend every available evening riding the track on his bicycle until Christmas 1996, when his father finally bought him his first motorcycle - a Kawasaki 60cc. Just a month later, when he reached the minimum racing age of six, he took part in his first competition at the circuit by his house. From that day onwards he was rarely off a motocross or supercross bike and he was a regular contender in the British Motocross Championship, winning the title in 2001.

He looked set for a bright future in off-road racing until 2003, when he broke his leg and was ruled out for three months. The time away gave him chance to consider an alternative career and Bradley now sees the injury as a positive thing because it was during his period of convalescence that he decided to switch codes and trade in his career as a motorcross racer for a future in road racing.

He tried his hand on tarmac for the first time in 2004, finishing fourth in the MRO Superteen series, including a race victory at Lydden, and seventh in the MRO GP 125cc series despite only taking part in three rounds.

In 2005 Bradley entered the 125cc Spanish Championship, riding a Honda for the MotoGP Academy Team. He missed out on the title by a single point after taking victory in the final three rounds at Albacete, Valencia and Jerez. That same year he also registered tenth place overall in the 125cc British Championship, despite missing several rounds due to his commitments with the MotoGP Academy.

However, it was his performances in Spain that had converted him into the bright hope of British motorcycle racing and secured a deal with the Repsol team for his debut 125cc World Championship season in 2006. Riding a Honda, at the age of fifteen the teenager took the title of Rookie of the Year, with stand-out performances in Japan, Great Britain, Germany and Valencia. In 2007 he was a regular points-scorer, confirming his reputation as one of the most promising talents in the World Championship, ending that season eighth overall.

Bradley, known for being methodical and thorough in his approach to racing, signed for the Polaris World team in 2008 as his career continued to progress on a factory Aprilia RSA.

The season saw him become a consistent frontrunner in practice and in the races although he was robbed of his dream of a first victory at World Championship level when crashing out of the lead on several occasions. However, it was still the year Bradley confirmed his reputation as one of the top young riders in the category, ending the season sixth overall.

In 2009 both the British youngster and the Bancaja Aspar team are hoping to create a winning partnership. The Spanish outfit have spent two years chasing Bradley's signature and are ready to give him all the resources he needs to challenge for his first victory, and hopefully many more.


Source: Aspar Media

Bradley Smith hails Randy Mamola influence

British 125GP world championship hopeful Bradley Smith believes the influence of mentor and former Moto GP star Randy Mamola will be crucial ahead of his 2009 campaign.
The Aspar Aprilia rider has spent large spells of his winter holed up at Mamola’s Barcelona home to train ahead of his fourth assault on the 125GP world crown.

And the 18-year-old has told MCN how Mamola has helped him take a more relaxed approach to his racing as he prepares for the first round in Qatar this weekend as one of the big pre-season favourites.
Smith’s early years in road racing were spent under the tutelage of tough task master Alberto Puig, who helped nurture the likes of Casey Stoner and Dani Pedrosa.

But having worked closely with Mamola to prepare for a season where he hopes to finally break his victory duck, Smith told MCN: “Having Randy around he’s a very mellow person when it comes to the mental side of racing.
"He always gives me his opinion and that is very honest. He’s always got a different way of looking at things.

Also being around his son Dakota and seeing how he goes about racing, he goes to have fun. Sure when he sits on the start line he is 100 per cent focused, but around the paddock he is all chilled out.
"That just shows me that when you put your visor down, within those couple of seconds you’re in race mode. But when you take the helmet off you need to take it off and put everything to one side.

"It has definitely helped a lot just having a different point of view rather just full on attack.
"It has helped me see the bigger picture. So hopefully I’ll be a little bit faster and little bit more chilled out.”

BatiFans.com Announces RACECARD '09 Competition

Okay - a quick and cheeky bit of non-125Brits pimping if you'll forgive me just this once... A sure sign that the fun's about to begin in MotoGP is the announcement of the annual BatiFans.com RACECARD Competition...
It's dead simple - for every 250cc race in 2009 you can enter your qualifying and race predictions for how Alvaro Bautista is going to do. You get 5 points for a correct qualy prediction and 10 points for a correct race result.
We keep an eye on the scores, and at the end of the season one lucky winner walks off with some great prizes, like a rare Alvaro Bautista photo-biography, a diecast model of his 2005 Seedorf Honda, and a superb documentary about Alvaro on DVD.
It's free to enter and open to all members of the BatiFans Forum and adds an extra bit of fun and excitement to each race weekend.

Just get clicking on the link to find out more about the RACECARD 2009 Competition...
Sign up, join in, and bag yourself a bunch of fun across the season - and possibly a great prize at the end of it.

Smith goes Back to Basics in Simon chase

Only the smallest of margins has separated Bradley Smith and Bancaja Aspar teammate Julián Simón in 125cc preseason testing, with the latter having had the lion’s share of the bragging rights since his return to the class.
Smith was once again close to knocking his rival from the head of the timesheet at last week’s Official Test in Jerez, although in the end the Briton had to settle for second place and a positive feeling with the setup of his Aprilia RSA.

Bradley comments:

“It’s been a long process. We tried lots of things, but in the end we arrived back at what we are most comfortable using, which is what we were riding last year,” revealed Smith, who already has a year of experience with the factory bike under his belt from his time with the Polaris World squad. “The base setting is the same, just with a few changes from what we’ve tested.

“We’re only .1 away from the fastest time in Jerez, which is enough at the moment, and now it’s just a case of putting it all together. I’ve been riding on my own, trying to improve everything, and in Qatar we will hopefully be there with Simon, who is the one to catch at the moment.”

Bradley Smith challenges Lewis Hamilton

British 125gp world title hopeful Bradley Smith has tried to challenge Formula One world champion Lewis Hamilton to a motocross battle.
The Aspar Aprilia rider met the McLaren driver during a recent pre-season f1 test in Barcelona while he was training at randy mamola’s house.

The 18-year-old told MCN: "He is such a nice guy. He’s a big motocrosser, that’s where he started from too.
"Me being from motocross as well I was trying to get him to sign up for a day on the bikes! He was a really nice guy and really down to earth."
Smith said he also used the experience to change his perception of Formula One having got the chance to observe Hamilton from trackside at the Catalunya circuit.

"I could go round the circuit slip road and have a look at those cars. It’s amazing because you think they are just flat-out and turn it. But those cars move around so much without traction control and you can see which cars are set up for the slow corners and which for the fast corners
"To see that side of F1, I’ve taken back my first impressions of it being really boring. Those guys are putting in a lot of effort and the speed they carry is something else."
Smith finished second during last weekend’s Jerez test session while Hamilton started the defence of his F1 title with third place in Australia.

IRTA Test Jerez Day 2

Session 1

1 Julian SIMON (APRILIA) 1:47.520
2 Marc MARQUEZ (KTM) 1:47.625
3 Bradley SMITH (APRILIA) 125cc 1:47.692
4 Pol ESPARGARO (DERBI) 1:47.920
5 Andrea IANNONE (APRILIA) 1:47.929
6 Takaaki NAKAGAMI (APRILIA) 1:47.983
7 Sandro CORTESE (DERBI) 1:48.023
8 Efren VAZQUEZ (DERBI) 1:48.322
9 Joan OLIVE (DERBI) 1:48.364
10 Sergio GADEA (APRILIA) 1:48.532
12 Scott REDDING (APRILIA) 1:48.590
14 Danny WEBB (APRILIA) 1:48.744

30 Matthew HOYLE (HAOJUE) 1:53.117

Session 2

1 Julian SIMON (APRILIA) 1:47.465
2 Andrea IANNONE (APRILIA) 1:47.530
3 Bradley SMITH (APRILIA) 1:48.301
4 Marc MARQUEZ (KTM) 1:48.394
5 Sandro CORTESE (DERBI) 1:48.401
6 Scott REDDING (APRILIA) 1:48.418
7 Danny WEBB (APRILIA) 1:48.665

8 Sergio GADEA (APRILIA) 125cc 1:48.748
9 Joan OLIVE (DERBI) 1:49.123
10 Takaaki NAKAGAMI (APRILIA) 1:49.254

26 Matthew HOYLE (HAOJUE) 1:53.355

Bradley Smith after Day 1 at Jerez

"Basically today we have only one round of production, because we had an incident with the bike. At first we did not know what it was, so the mechanics have had a hard day's work, frankly, doing and undoing in finding the solution . The problems have come from the gearbox, was not able to change gears either. Anyway, thanks to the good work we have spare equipment to keep working, but it was too late and I've only been able to give a couple good lap. The positive is that we have solved our problem and we still have two full days of work. We're still a little behind in normal time but they will be ready tomorrow to climb records in both positions. "

IRTA Test Jerez Day 1

Session 1

1 Andrea IANNONE (APRILIA) 1:48.134

2 Julian SIMON (APRILIA)1:48.294

3 Marc MARQUEZ (KTM) 1:48.621

4 Pol ESPARGARO (DERBI) 1:48.898

5 Sergio GADEA (APRILIA) 1:49.142

6 Dominique AEGERTER (DERBI) 1:49.144

7 Joan OLIVE (DERBI) 1:49.202

8 Sandro CORTESE (DERBI) 1:49.230

9 Scott REDDING (APRILIA) 1:49.359

10 Efren VAZQUEZ (DERBI) 1:49.464

11 Bradley SMITH (APRILIA) 1:49.519

20 Danny WEBB (APRILIA) 1:51.345

27 Matthew HOYLE (HAOJUE) 1:56.323

Session 2

1 Julian SIMON (APRILIA) 1:47.345

2 Efren VAZQUEZ (DERBI) 1:48.023

3 Andrea IANNONE (APRILIA) 1:48.368

4 Marc MARQUEZ (KTM) 1:48.534

5 Pol ESPARGARO (DERBI) 1:48.713

6 Sergio GADEA (APRILIA) 1:48.756

7 Bradley SMITH (APRILIA) 1:48.828

8 Jonas FOLGER (APRILIA) 1:48.921

9 Sandro CORTESE (DERBI) 1:48.930

10 Scott REDDING (APRILIA) 1:49.014

18 Danny WEBB (APRILIA) 1:50.244

29 Matthew HOYLE (HAOJUE) 2:15.588

Haojue Team in new design

Matthew Hoyle made his first appearance in the newly designed Haojue outfit today after his team had to change its name from Maxtra and therefore renew all previously produced livery.

Bradley Smith happy with engine performance tweaks

Bradley Smith reckons engine performance tweaks have significantly improved his Aspar Aprilia 125GP machine after a successful test in Estoril this week.

His Spanish team ran different engine configurations during the Portugal test as the British teenager ended fourth quickest overall.

And despite finishing a massive 1.3s adrift of dominant Aspar Aprilia team-mate Julian Simon, Smith was satisfied with his own display with just five days of testing remaining before the first race in Qatar on April 12.

Smith enjoyed his best world championship campaign in 2008 with four podium finishes.

“I was able to consistently ride in the 46s and I was happy with the work I was doing with the bike. It was another 160 laps on another completely different circuit and I think testing in Estoril was necessary.

"We normally always ride in Valencia and Jerez and you can get into a bit of a rut and you don’t end up trying too much. We improved the engine a lot in Estoril. The team has been working very hard since the first couple of tests and they came up with some new configurations. The engine was really on song and felt really powerful. The acceleration was much better.

"I was able to come out of corners and the bike felt much pokier and it seemed to drive really hard and that is really important in 125s. It’s more important that top speed. Acceleration and mid-range is where you need to work and we made another big step. The moment you get on the throttle it powers through the rpm and picks up a lot quicker with a lot more power.”

Blusens Aprilia team relishing chance to fight at front..

Blusens Aprilia Team Manager Ricard Jové has recruited Spanish youngster Esteve Rabat to ride alongside Scott Redding this year and the team’s preparations for the 2009 World Championship are going well.

After another successful preseason test at Estoril earlier this week the team move on to the forthcoming Jerez and Qatar dates in good spirits, with both of their riders quickly adapting well to their new Aprilia RSA machines.

Summarising the preseason to date Jové comments, “We listen to what the riders say and we can look at the timesheets, but we will only really know how competitive we are when we get to the first race at Qatar. Thanks to the good preseason conditions we have had we have been able to work hard to prepare for the start of the championship.”

He added, “The boys are amongst the group of riders pushing towards the top, although there are a couple of standout riders out in front who have set themselves apart so far this year. This is BQR’s first season with factory 125cc bikes and the riders and their technical teams are adjusting to them really well. Scott and Tito (Esteve) both have a real chance to fight at the front now.”

Scott Redding comments:

“I feel more and more comfortable every time I ride the RSA. We are working really hard to find a good set-up before the start of the season and it is getting close. We still aren't 100% sorted, but we are getting there. What I really like about the bike is how powerful it is in the low revs, but what I’m finding hardest is to get a good setting with the chassis. At the last test in Estoril we started with quite a few problems but we worked our way through them and I think we will get to the Official Test at Jerez in good shape.”